The Kids Come First

By Joy Pullmann

This week my husband and I made a big decision. It was to take a big pay cut and leave a job I enjoy so I can keep my kids from outside childcare. Right now, as readers know, my husband stays home with the kids most days while I work most days. I am comfortable with my children being cared for by their father if not always by me. But he will go to graduate school this fall. For a few months, I was not exactly sure what we would do with the kids, but my plan involved finding regular childcare, from either an extended family member or some nice local lady. I was not extremely pleased with the idea but was ok with our three little ones spending about 15 hours a week with someone who was not their mommy or daddy.

Long story short, another job offer came along, and I've been given the gift of cutting our income in half, which still pays our basic expenses, while continuing to do some of what I love. But, most of all, I don't have to outsource my children. And that means the most to me.

Apparently, Baby Bunching Is a Thing

By Joy Pullmann

I had no idea there was a name for our inability to schedule conception, which has resulted in three babies in four years. But, apparently, there is. It's even trademarked, and there's a book coming. It's called "baby bunching."

According to other women I chat with, older women will often go deliberately for baby bunching because they have fewer good years of fertility left and they want to get kids in while they can. Some want to get the birthing years over with, which I am quite sympathetic to (I'm playing with the idea of "four by 30" but I hate pregnancy so much we'll see if we make it...or, which is more likely, if we continue to have children constantly despite my hoped-for 30-year cutoff). Other, less-organized people like me, keep having these kids during what are obviously highly fertile years, and we won't kill them, so we love them instead.

A Community Is Better than Experts

By Joy Pullmann

My three-year-old son learned a new word this week: Proud. I told him for the first time I was proud of him when he learned to ditch his diapers, all in three days. I'm not sure he understands what the word means--it's an abstract concept, after all, which is why he hasn't heard it before--but it was the best way I could think to express my approval.

My husband actually changes most of the diapers in this house, and makes most of the meals (we havesome role reversal going on because I'm currently the full-time breadwinner), so I wasn't as much relieved to get out of a big chore of mine as tickled pink my little boy managed to figure this out so fast. I mean, he went from peeing in his pants without thinking about it to marching himself to the bathroom at the right impulse, pulling pants down and up himself, doing his business, and cleaning up afterward. That was a lot to learn in six hours. But we haven't had an accident in two days (fingers crossed), and there were a few unintentional ones the two days before that.

Nursing on CSPAN

By Joy Pullmann

One day, I had a radio interview. My husband usually minds the kids while I work, but this time he had to be away, so we hired a new babysitter for the morning. Right before the interview, I put the kids in their swim diapers and ushered them all outside so I couldn't hear them but they'd have a good time.

My toddler son chose that very moment to throw a wild tantrum. Note it was a new babysitter, and my son's tantrums are like a heavy metal rock concert packed into one child, complete with live bat-eating. 

Radio shows have regular commercial breaks, and I was set to be on this show for a whole hour. So at the first break I rushed downstairs, phone on mute, to rescue the poor babysitter. Turns out my son wanted to be done with water (heaven knows why--he's obsessed with water) and was demanding a diaper change. And *I* had to do the diaper change, not the babysitter we'd hired for this very reason. So I'm frantically tearing his clothes off and trotting my pregnant self up and down with new clothes and a diaper, when the commercial break ends, mid-change. So I rush upstairs, trying not to breathe hard into the phone, and switch back to interview expert. Next commercial break, my kid is still sitting there, at least only whimpering now, half-diapered. I finish him up in two minutes and tell the babysitter to read them books, right before dashing upstairs again and holding my breath in to what I hope sounds like normal breathing. 

Along the same lines, Mary (from this blog) recently told me of a very well-educated mom who works part-time from home with her three kids. This venerable lady recently went on CSPAN when her newest was only two months old, so when he was hungry she just topped him with a blanket and nursed him on air.

Moms Conflicted about Schools

A few months ago, I was interviewing a woman who works at a nationwide nonprofit concerned with education. We were talking about picking your child's school. She had just done that with her kindergarten-age daughter, and I could tell it had been an agonizing decision. In fact, in my job as an education reporter, I frequently talk to women about their child's school, and I can hear the same angst in their voices that I do when women talk about working outside the home, or a natural birth, or all of these other Mommy Wars topics. Just last week, an Oklahoma mom and friend discussed with frustration her child's school, which closed right when her difficult daughter was ending sixth grade, which we all know to be a crucial time in itself without extra disruption.

Moms feel guilty about their kids' education like we feel guilty about everything else. And I'm about to point out something that may make some feel more guilty, but I don't mean it that way, and I'll explain why.

It is simply unarguable that the very best U.S. public schools are not very good. The sort of parents who care deeply about getting their kids a good education generally don't know this. Like one of our previous landlords, who bought a big expensive house and rented out half of it to pay the mortgage so her daughter could be in a good public school district, these parents sacrifice a good deal to get their kids the best preparation for life they can. So to tell them the truth—that their sacrifice often has not bought that much—seems incredibly cruel.